LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Shelf .RV:'£0 S3 






UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



CLOSE THE SALOONS. 



PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 



BY 

ATTICUS G. HAYGOOD, D. D., 

PRESIDENT OF EMORY COLLEGE. 






13.0Q / 




MACON, GEORGIA: 

STEREOTYPED BY J. W. BURKE & COMPANY. 

1880. 




.«•* 

^ 



DEDICATION. 



THIS FIRESIDE TALK WITH MY FELLOW- CITIZENS 

IS DEDICATED TO ALL 

MEN AND WOMEN WHO HAVE CONVICTIONS, AND ARE WILLING 

TO 
TRY TO BE FREE. 

A. G. H. 

Oxford, Ga., July i, 1880. 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 



THE ENEMY THAT IS NEAREST AND STRONGEST. 

MANY good people are talking about making a square 
fight against the liquor business. Enough has been 
done to excite interest in some ; hope in others. 
The conscience of the country has never been thoroughly 
aroused on this most momentous and exigent question. 
But the hearts of good men and women are beginning tc 
" burn within" them. The best people are beginning to 
wake up ; when they are once awake they will do some- 
thing. 

Trie foe is worthy our steel ; Christian civilization has no 
stronger enemy. His garrisons are everywhere, and yet 
many of us are firing long range guns at Darwin, Huxley, 
and the rest ! One bar-room can do more harm in any 
village than all the infidels that ever perverted science or 
sneered at religion. Let us lower our guns and load with 
canister. The enemy is in point-blank range. 

Let us not under-estimate our adversary. Darius did 
that at Arbela and Alexander crushed him. If we win it 
will not be an easy victory. We must do something more 
than 

" March up the hill and then march down again." 

And we have not a musket to spare. 

Few of us apprehend the magnitude of the liquor business 
in the United States. It never has been put into figures, 
for much of it evades law and escapes report. If it could 
be reported in its huge proportions it would not be com- 
prehended, for hardly any body really understands what a 
million means. But let us trv. 

The fullest and most reliable statistics on the subject are 
found in the Annual Reports of the Commissioner of In« 



4 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

ternal Revenue. We have before us the report of the 
Commissioner, the Hon. Green B. Raum, for the fiscal 
year ending June 30, 1879. We thank the Commissioner ; 
his report is almost a perfect statistical work. 

THERE ARE MILLIONS IN IT. 

Let us consider some of the facts set forth by these be- 
wildering tables. We must take them gradually ; no man 
can take them in at once. 

To begin : Last year was the " banner year," surpassing 
every preceding year in our history in the magnitude of 
the business. The total net increase in production of all 
kinds of " spirits" was 15,789,568 gallons. Commissioner 
Raum says: "The quantity of spirits, 71,892,621 gallons, 
produced and deposited in distillery warehouses during the 
fiscal year ending June 30, 1879, was greater than the 
quantity produced during any other year." 

Let us spell out these figures : There were produced in 
the United States from June 30, 1878, to June 30, 1879, 
seventy one millions eight hundred and ninety-two thousand 
six hundred and twenty-one gallons of intoxicating liquors ! 
This does not include the floods of liquor made by " moon- 
shiners " in illicit distilleries. A reputable United States 
District Attorney told the writer that there were " 700 
illicit distilleries" in one of the States. 

WHERE WAS ALL THIS LIQUOR MADE? 

In 5,444 distilleries. Of these y 616 are in Georgia. 
North Carolina has 1,276 — 496 more than Virginia, the 
next highest in number. Florida, Idaho, New Hampshire 
have one each. Idaho distills grain, Florida and New 
Hampshire, molasses. It would be a mistake to measure 
the number of gallons by the number of distilleries. Thus, 
Georgia has 26 " grain " distilleries ; of these 16 have " a 
daily " grain capacity of not exceeding 10 bushels ; 3 are 
under 5 bushels; 4 under 20; only one over 100 bushels. 
But Illinois has 21 whose daily capacity for spoiling grain 
exceeds 500 bushels. One Illinois distillery of the largest 
sixe exceeds all Georgia's 26. Kentucky has 47 that exceed 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

ioo bushels a day. Of North Carolina's distilleries, 184 
do not exceed 5 bushels a day. Georgia, the Carolinas, 
Virginia and some others, distill " fruit" for the most 
part. Thus of Georgia's 616, 587 distill fruit; of North 
Carolina's 1,276, 996 distill fruit — little apple and peach 
brandy stills mostly, of small capacity severally, but of 
vast power to " steal men's brains, " taken together. 

HOW IS IT DISPOSED OF? 

Liquor is made to "drink as a beverage," very little 
being used in the mechanic arts or (legitimately) as medi- 
cine. How does this sea of spirits get into people's mouths 
and into their stomachs? First, there are the "middle- 
men" — the "wholesale dealers." There are 4,252 of 
them. New York leads here — as everywhere else in things 
bad as well as good — with 717; Vermont closes the pro- 
cession with one. (Bat Vermont " retailers" are not sol- 
itary — there are 440 of them.) Ohio with 408, comes 
next to New York in the number of wholesale dealers ; 
Pennsylvania follows close with 401 ; California with 262 ; 
Illinois with 217; and, shocking to tell! Massachusetts 
with 215 ! 

Georgia has 68 wholesale dealers — 68 too many. 

A few of them are in the church. They should quit 
their business, quit the church, or be turned out. 

There are of " rectifiers "—word of curious and fearful 
import — i ; o55, New York claiming 211 of them; Penn- 
sylvania, 19S ) Ohio, 103 '; California, 90 ; Georgia has 12 ; 
Florida none. Massachusetts is tolerably strong in " rec- 
tifying" whisky — as also in "rectifying" other things, 
politics, literature, science, theology, philosophy, man- 
ners, "the South" in particular. 

A GREAT ARMY 
Of retailers sells to consumers. It is enough to take 
one's breath — this army with screens instead of " banners." 
There are, Mr. Raum tells us, in this " Nation" — in these 
United States — 155,850 retailers. New York claims the 
lion's share, as usual. The Empire State has, for her 
drunkard-making industries, 23,448 retailers. 



6 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

(Some New York people are under the delusion that 
they should do missionary work in Georgia. Dear, good, 
magnanimous fellows they are ! ) 

Georgia has a fearful number of " retailers." How 
many boys they have enticed ! How many men ruined ! 
How many homes blighted ! How many jails filled ! How 
many gallow's trees loaded down ! 

Pennsylvania is next to New York, with 15,122 "re- 
tailers." Ohio follows with 14,758; Illinois with 9,806. 
Among the new States, California leads with 8,787. Mass- 
achusetts, alas ! has 6,333 retailers. The six New England 
States acknowledge to 11,940; six Southern States, Georgia, 
Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina 
and Texas, confess to 13,981. The census of 1870 says 
that there were in the six New England States 3,487,724 
people ; in the six Southern States, named here, 5,334,812. 
The curious may find the proportions. But neither of 
these " six States M can afford to make ugly speeches to the 
other six. 

GEORGIA'S CASE IS BAD, 

Inexpressibly bad — so bad that she should not, at this 
time, send temperance missionaries even to Massachusetts, 
so much worse off. Georgia, " Empire State of the South/' 
has 2,372 "retailers" of intoxicating liquors. It is a 
great shame and a great curse. 

THE NATION'S CAPITAL 

The most startling and frightful statistics concern that 
little " parcel of ground " called the District of Columbia. 
It is now included in the Maryland district and is not 
separately reported in the volume before us. But it was 
reported for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1877. That 
year the District reported 1,105 "licensed" drinking 
houses. Of course this means almost solely Washington 
City. Yet some people wonder that our politics " smells 
to heaven " in its rank corruption. 

In sight and hearing and smelling and tasting distance 
of the national Solons, there were in 1877, 1,105 drinking 
houses. Judging by recent Washington history their 
number has not diminished. 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 7 

All honor to Mrs. Hayes, courageous mistress of the 
White House, for banishing intoxicating liquors from her 
entertainments ! She deserves immortal honor for this 
brave and womanly deed. Of this glory the dram-drinkers 
cannot rob her. She has blessed Washington City of a 
truth. 

WHAT IS IT MADE OF? 

We do not speak here of virulent poisons that, by a 
thousand tests and analyses, have been found in most of 
the liquors sold, but of the good and wholesome material 
that has been spoiled in its production. Let poor men 
and hungry men, who so often vote for drunkards to make 
laws and vote against " prohibition, " when a test is made, 
read and ponder what follows. During the year ending 
June 30th, 1879, tne distilleries used up 13,985,745 bush- 
els of corn. Let us spell it out — thirteen million nine 
hundred and eighty-five thousand seven hmtdred and forty- 
five bushels of corn turned into whisky in one year. And 
2,838,933 bushels of rye ; 1,334*897 bushels of malt. 
Also, 2,801,307 gallons of molasses. Of the 13,985,745 
bushels of corn ruined into whisky, Illinois is answerable 
for 6,075,944 bushels; Ohio for 2,544,486; Indiana for 
1,543,966; Kentucky for 1,685,170. Illinois leads in spoil- 
ing rye as in spoiling corn — using up 841,215 bushels; 
Ohio, 4o7>975- 

OUR DRINKING FACILITIES. 

• Let us "cypher" a little. Into 45,000,000 — believed 
to be approximately the population of the United States— 
155,850 " goes " 288 times and several to " carry." Thai 
is to say, there is one " licensed " drinking-house to every 
288 of the population, including men, women and chil- 
dren ! It is to be hoped that very few women patronize 
bar-rooms. Supposing that the sexes are about equally 
divided, we have (hot counting the many thousands of 
unlicensed drinking-houses of all kinds) one place where 
drinks can be bought, and where people get drunk to every 
144 of the inhabitants — counting white and red and black, 
tipplers, drunkards, sober men, sinners, saints, youths, 
boys, and male infants. 



8 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

If half our men do not drink, what floods are swallowed 
by those who do ! The facts, the naked facts, are astound- 
ing. The unreported facts that historically and legiti- 
mately belong to this business ; facts that the Commissioner 
does not and cannot tabulate, are almost paralyzing. They 
would be paralyzing if there were not a conscience-power 
in this country that has never fairly roused itself for the 
conflict. 

Good people do indeed " wrestle against wicked spirits M 
in " high M and in " low " places. And these spirits are full 
of Satanic power and resources. 

It is no longer doubted that the majority of crimes that 
disgrace our daily history have their root in drinking- 
shops. The statistics of crime in every court establish 
this opinion. 

Whose son is safe ? Whose daughter is safe from the 
death-in-life mischance of being a drunkard's wife ? Whose 
life is safe, where men, maddened with drink, have free 
range in the streets ? 

The Atlanta Constitution, of April 13th, 1880, contained 
a telegram from New Orleans, that told of a young man 
in a Louisiana town rushing out of a bar-room drunk, 
raving and flourishing a pistol. He shot dead the first 
man he saw, turned to run, and was himself shot dead in 
the street. 

The same paper a few days later contained a telegram 
from Knoxville, Tennessee, telling us that a young married 
man, with wife and two babies dependent on his labor, 
killed his mother with a crib-slat, striking her on her head 
and slaying her on the spot. He was drunk. 

Such things may happen any day anywhere. They are 
only a sample. 

Are we to sit still forever? 

WHISKY AND MISERY. 
It is not proposed in this pamphlet to draw pictures ; let 
people open their eyes and look about them. In what 
town are there not victims to this pestilence ? In what 
family are there not taints of this leprosy? The miseries 
that come out of strong drink cannot be expressed in fig- 
ures. Disease, pauperism, murder, lust, hunger, cold, 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 9 

nakedness, dishonor, broken hearts and blighted lives — 
these cannot be summed up in figures. Here follow some 
true and strong words by Canon Farrar, of the Church of 
England. They tell something of the work of liquor in 
the mother country. They are part of an address deliv- 
ered in the Sheldonian Theatre in the University city of 
Oxford. What is true in England is true in our own coun- 
try — true in its measure in every neighborhood where in- 
toxicating drinks are sold. Canon Farrar said : 

" I look around me, not here in England only, but also through all 
the world, over dependencies over which the sun never sets, and I see 
the frightful, the intolerable evidences of the devastation wrought by 
one fatal sin, the sin of drunkenness ; and that sin caused by one fatal 
product, alcohol diluted in intoxicating drinks. I am unable, I have 
not the heart to-day to touch on one tenth or one hundredth part of the 
proofs which demonstrate to every serious mind, which is at all ac- 
quainted with the facts, the awful importance of this question. Focus 
the lurid gleams which flash upward from this pit of destruction, and 
you will see how frightful is the glare. Track the subterranean ram- 
ifications of this evil, and you will see how the whole nation, the 
whole empire, is undermined ; how every step we take is over fire 
ever bursting through the treacherous ashes. 

" It is matter, not of assertion, but of sternest demonstration, that 
the drink traffic causes the most amazing waste of our national re- 
sources ; that to it are due, mainly and almost exclusively, the worst 
phenomena of pauperism ; that it causes seventy-five per cent, of those 
melancholy cases of domestic ruin which fill our police courts ; that 
it contributes enormously, both directly and indirectly, to the hideous 
social evil ; that, but for it, on the testimony of nearly every judge on 
the bench, crimes of violence would well nigh disappear'; that it is 
the cause, both directly and indirectly, of a most terrible mortality ; 
that it chokes our prisons, mad-houses and penitentiaries; that it 
creates an hereditary taint, which makes life a curse to a stunted pop- 
ulation ; that because of it thousands, aye, tens of thousands of miser- 
able men and yet more miserable women, and poor little children 
most miserable of all, lead lives of such squalor and anguish as only 
they who have witnessed can conceive ; that it devastates the human- 
ity, and blights the bodies and the souls, not only of 600,000 drunk- 
ards, but of the millions which their ruin drags down to shame ; that 
it frustrates our religious efforts at home ; that it destroys and ruins 
our mission efforts abroad ; that it is the chief bane and ruin of oui 
homes; that it is the darkest stain on the glory and the prosperity of 
our nation. Exaggeration ! Gentlemen, there is not one word of this 
indictment which is not true to the letter; not one word of it which 
is not capable of the most rigorous proof which evidence can estab- 
lish and statistics contain." 



10 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

WHAT THE JUDGES SAY. 

The writer asked a few well known gentlemen, who have 
had large opportunity for reaching correct conclusions on 
this subject, to give their judgment for use in this pamphlet, 
on the " relation of drunkenness to criminal statistics. M 
Here follow their answers — -scores of such statements could 
be obtained : 

JUDGE HILLYER. 

The Hon. George Hillyer is Judge of the Atlanta Circuit. 
He writes : 

"Atlanta, Ga., April 19th, 1880. 
" Rev. A. G. Haygood, D. D., Oxford, Ga. 

" Dear Sir: — You ask me for my testimony touching intemperance 
in its relation to crime. 

" It is my deliberate opinion, based on a somewhat extended obser- 
vation, that of all causes which produce crime, intemperance is by far 
the greatest. In trials, especially for crimes of violence, drink is 
almost sure to figure, and always as a factor of evil in the tragedy. 
Take away the flrink, and you are pretty apt to take away the crime. 
Experience on this subject is so unvarying in the court house, that 
the proof amounts to a demonstration. Any just means looking to 
abatement of an evil so great ought to have the prayers and the aid oi 
all good men. Very respectfully, 

" GEO. HILLYER, Judge S. C, A. C." 

RECORDER MILLEDGE. 

The Hon. John Milledge is City Recorder in Atlanta, 
Georgia, and has almost daily dealings with the criminal 
classes. He writes : 

" Atlanta, Ga., April 16th, 1880. 
" Rev. A. G. Haygood, Oxford, Ga. : 

" My Dear Sir : — In answer to your inquiry of the 15th, touching 
the connection and bearing of drunkenness upon the criminal records 
of our State and country, I think I can safely say, after an experience 
of twenty years in criminal courts, for three years of which time I 
have presided as Judge of the Police Court of the city of Atlanta, 
that one half of the aggravated cases of crime, upon the books, can 
be traced, directly or indirectly, to the influence and effect of liquor, 
and that more of human misery and human depravity is due to the 
improper use of alcoholic and malt liquors than all the other evil in- 
fluences which have for their effect the mental, moral and physical 
destruction of human beings. 

" I am yours very respectfully, 

" JOHN MILLEDGE/' 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. ll 

JUDGE HOPKINS. 

The Hon. John L. Hopkins has had large experience 
and observation as lawyer and judge. He was six years on 
the bench of the Atlanta Circuit. He writes : 

"Atlanta, Ga., April 21st, 1880. 
" Rev. A. G. Haygood : 

" My Dear Sir : — As Judge of the Atlanta Circuit from the year 
1870 to 1876, I had to deal with a vast amount of crime. There were 
all kinds of criminals and every grade of offence. I gave it close 
attention, and it is not an exaggeration to say that, in nearly all of it, 
strong drink was an active agent. In some form or other it was al- 
most always present. It is impossible to tell what percentage of crime 
is traceable to this cause It is a rare and exceptional case if it has 
not whisky in it, somewhere or somehow. It is entirely safe to say 
that, without it, there would be but little crime. My observation in 
the court-house for thirty years has been to the same effect. 

" Undoubtedly it is the great mischief maker. In this life, reason 
and passion contend for the mastery. In the struggle, whisky does 
double duty — it weakens reason and strengthens passion. Aside from 
the crime, grief and pain that flow from it, it costs more probably than 
all other agencies combined. It takes a very liberal part of what the 
people make to pay its way. Without it taxation would be compara- 
tively nominal To it, in a large measure, we are indebted for bad 
government, faithless officials, heavy taxation, want and woe. 
" Truly yours, . 

" JOHN L. HOPKINS." 

JUDGE POTTLE 

Presides in the Northern Circuit. He writes: 

"Warrenton, Ga., April 26th, 1880. 

" My Dear Brother Haygood.' — Your letter of the 14th came while 
I was away on the circuit ; my reply may be too late, but I will answer 
anyhow. 

"My opinion is, that at least two-thirds of the crimes which have 
come under my observation on the Bench, are traceable directly 01 
remotely to liquor. 

"In the c _ se of crimes, for using insulting and obscene language 
in the presence of females, I may say, almost always they are traceable 
to the intemperate use of liquor. 

" The prohibition in this town and within a radius of two miles has 
had a most salutary effect. 

" There is one thing that ought to be known, and impressed on the 
officers in other counties, having the power to grant license ; and that 



12 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

is, the law gives them the discretion to grant or refuse license. I 
speak of the general law. If they would refuse, there would be no 
necessity for local option laws. I am yours very trub , 

"E. H. POTTLE." 

Let us remember, there is not a judge, nor solicitor- 
general, nor sheriff, nor police-officer in the United States, 
who, in his heart, has any other opinion as to the relations 
of "drunkenness to criminal statistics/ ' 

LIQUOR AND BAD POLITICS. 

Our limits only allow us to touch on this topic ; every 
good citizen bewails the corruption of our politics. It is 
everywhere; in the nation; in the States; in the great 
cities; in little villages; in country settlements. It is in 
both parties ; if there be more than two, it is in all of them. 
Everybody knows that whisky plays an important part in 
our elections. It has carried many an election in the inter- 
est of bad men, who love not their country, but the "loaves 
and fishes." It is a wide-spread and monstrous evil, but 
it is so common that it has ceased to surprise us ; it has 
almost ceased to shock us. In many an election, a corner 
bar-room has exercised more influence than half a dozen 
churches. The Richmond Christian Advocate, of April 15, 
1880, had this paragraph in the editorial leader: 

" A few days ago, the keeper of a * saloon ' in this city, boasted in 
our hearing, that the bar-keepers were bigger men in this city than 
all the churches, and that they could ' clean out' all the praying peo- 
ple, and rule Richmond as they pleased. He had unmixed contempt 
for the whole race of church goers. They seemed to him a pusillan- 
imous set, mumbling prayers for the spread of religion on Sunday 
and at home, but meekly going to the polls and voting for the candi- 
dates selected by the worst elements in the community." 

No wonder such bar-keepers have a contempt for pray- 
ing men — praying one way and voting another. 

A SOUTHERN DANGER. 

In the Northern States dram-drinking and ignorant for- 
eigners are the dangerous classes in politics. In the South 
there are few foreigners, but there are several millions oi 
recently enfranchised negroes ; and in the South the great 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 13 

mass of them will remain. The " Exodus/ ' as it is called, 
will not amount to much. We are to live together. That 
they are not fitted for the franchise is no fault of theirs. 
But they vote and will continue to vote. Everybody knows 
that thousands of their votes can be bought for a drink oi 
whisky — as thousands of white votes can be bought. Votes 
so bought carry many elections. 

All good men should wisely and patiently point out to 
our colored citizens the monstrous evil of such voting. 
White people who are purchaseable, should be labored with 
also. But the danger is greater from the colored people, 
since so many are illiterate, and poor, and, approachable. 
Let them be taught the sacredness of the ballot. Their 
right education in this, as in other matters, may be a tedi- 
ous and discouraging process. But it is vital to us all, 
white and colored, that it be done. 7? is time to begin it. 

When drinking-houses are shut up, it will be easier. 

IT IS TIME 

to enter seriously upon a fight for deliverance from the 
thraldom of the liquor-power, under whose reign one bar- 
keeper boasts more power to control elections than all the 
churches in Richmond city. 

No wonder that crimes multiply, when the thirst for 
stimulants in the United States requires 155,850 ' ' licensed 
saloons" to quench or allay it — not counting the thou- 
sands of unlicensed and unrecognized grog-shops that help 
on the work of ruin. Only consider that there is in our 
country, one "licensed saloon" for every 288 of the popu- 
lation, counting saints and sinners, men, women, youths, 
children and infants ! 

We have past the time for picture painting ; the facts are 
coming home to us ; they are pressing down into the con- 
sciences of good people like red-hot branding-irons. We 
must deal with these facts. 

HOW LONG? 
The evidence is complete; the argument is invincible; 
the conclusion is thundered into our consciences. Every- 
body knows, or should know, that in these dram-shops, of 



14 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

high and low degree, nearly all the violent crimes that 
afflict and disgrace our society have their origin. Here 
murder is generated. Here lust is inflamed. Here every 
crime, known to the records of our courts, has its accessory 
before or after the fact. Here also, pauperism, with its 
inseparable vices and miseries, is born and bred. 

The heaviest burdens of government rest on the good 
citizens in their effort to protect society against the bad 
And the dram-shops are notoriously responsible for the 
greater part of these burdens. The burden grows as we 
carry it. The evil and the curse increase from day to day. 
Distilleries, breweries, wholesale liquor stores, drinking 
saloons, bar-rooms, sample rooms, grog-shops and preten- 
ded-drug-stores, multiply upon us like the frogs of Egypt. 
The whisky power grows by rapid and enormous incre- 
ments. Its strong hand, full of gold, and controlling thou- 
sands of ballots, has within the last decade been felt all 
the way down from the White House in Washington to the 
local magistrate's office in the frontier; from the National 
Congress to the smallest town council. 

A POWER THAT WINS. 

And this whisky power generally wins ; it generally car- 
ries the day in its contests with law and order; the bar- 
keeper has, in most elections, shown himself to be " a big- 
ger man than all the churches " in the city. 

At the present rate of progress, what will the liquor 
power be twenty years from to-day? Most of us who are 
in middle life are personally interested in this question ; 
certainly our children are. 

The longer we wait, the harder the fight will be. For 
come it must, unless conscience dies out of the church. 

WRINGING THEIR HANDS. 
Some timid souls are alarmed whenever it is proposed to 
grapple seriously with this curse and ruin of the people. 
When one says " moral suasion/' they say "amen;" if 
one talks of "prohibition," they shudder at the thought 
of what they call intolerance. Most of the shuddering 
comes not of any sensitive conscience about toleration, 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 15 

but of simple fear. Thousands of very good people when 
they contemplate the ravages of the liquor traffic imitate 
panic-stricken women when a house is on fire — wring 
their hands, cry and look on. Many persons will endure 
almost any evil, if they can only avoid the trouble of its 
suppression. 

AFRAID OF THE LION. 

Their argument for inaction is taken from their despair. 
They are afraid of the liquor power; theyjiave no faith; 
they are without hope or courage. As the case appears to 
us, there can be no doubt that one of the controlling in- 
fluences that deter the better classes of people from de- 
claring relentless war against the whisky power, is their 
fright at the prospect of an uproar from the army of men 
engaged in the manufacture and sale of intoxicating 
drinks. No doubt this lion will roar and show his teeth 
if good people unite to attack him. But it will not be the 
first time that the devil has roared against the children of 
light. The Barbary pirates raised a great uproar when 
Christian nations resolved to put them down. But they 
do not flaunt their flags in the Mediterranean to-day. 

THE RIGHT OF SUPPRESSION. 

It is amazing that men should doubt whether society 
has the right to enact and enforce laws against the whisky 
power. Some confound the right to close a bar room with 
the right to force a man to be moral. Thus we have heard 
prohibition opposed by some very good people — sober 
themselves — on the ground that "the State has no right 
to legislate in morals — that men can't be made moral by 
legislation. " We are not talking about the right to shut 
men's mouths and rectify their morals by law-power, but 
the right to shut bar-rooms. We are not talking of the 
right to legislate men into morality, but the right to put 
down a business that breeds all manner of vice, crime and 
misery. We are not, at this time, even discussing the 
question of the right and wrong of drunkenness, but oi 
the danger to society from the liquor traffic. We are not 



16 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

discussing a man's duty to be sober; but the right of so- 
ciety to protect itself against drunkenness. 

Our doctrine is: Organized society has, by Divine 
gift, the inalienable right to protect itself against vice and 
whatever breeds vice ; against whatever destroys its peace 
and life. The inconsistencies of those who deny to soci- 
ety the right to suppress the whisky traffic are many. They 
are glaring and indefensible. 

In the same speech or article we have heard an argu- 
ment against prohibition and in favor of taxing, by Mof- 
fett bell punch or other device, every drink that is sold or 
swallowed. We have heard in the same speech arguments 
against prohibition and in favor of heavy license tax. 
Many times and from many persons we have heard and 
read such arguments. That is : one has a right to " scotch 
a snake' ' but not to kill him; the right to cripple a mad 
dog but not the right to put him out of the way. Our po- 
sition is : If society has the right to repress the whisky 
traffic y it has the right to suppress it. 

CHIEF JUSTICE RICHIE, OF CANADA. 

While preparing this pamphlet we find in the papers the 
following : 

A telegram from Ottawa, Ont., of April 13th, says: 
"Judgment was given on the Canadian temperance act 
in the Supreme Court to-day. The attendance was large. 
The Princess Louise and suite, a number of members of 
Parliament, and prominent temperance advocates were 
present. Chief Justice Richie held that the British North 
American Act gave the Dominion power to enact laws 
tending to the peace, order, and the good government of 
the country, and legislation cannot be ultra vires where 
the act aims at the regulation of trade and commerce. 
He held the federal government had power to enact pro- 
hibitory legislation, for to his mind the power to regulate 
was power to prohibit. An appeal was allowed confirm- 
ing the constitutionality of the act." 

If "power to regulate implies power to prohibit/ ' cer- 
tainly power to repress, to hinder, to cripple, implies 
power to suppress. 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 17 

SOCIETY'S MAGNA CHARTA. 

Society, in every country and in every stage of civiliza- 
tion, claims and exercises the right to interfere, when the 
common good requires it, with personal preferences and 
individual interests. Government conscribes men to re- 
sist invasion in time of war; compels men to work on 
public roads ; to pay taxes. We blow up or pull down 
houses — the private property of citizens — to arrest the 
progress of a fire in a great city. In certain cases the State 
interferes with private rights so far as to put some men in 
jail and to hang others. It punishes bigamy, seduction, 
and adultery. It goes so far, but not too far, and punishes 
Sabbath-breaking. The State says to the citizen : " You 
must not work your farm on Sunday.' ' The State forbids 
the publication and sale of licentious books. The State 
says, in some cases, " You must not build a mill-dam on 
your property — it will breed sickness.' ' Or, " You must 
not build a guano warehouse on this lot — it smells bad, 
and your neighbors object." The State claims and exer- 
cises the right to "abate nuisances" 

The State confines madmen in lunatic asylums — not 
simply as a mercy to them, but also as a protection to 
others. The State arrests and imprisons rioters, and in a 
hundred ways interferes with the rights of persons and 
property. 

What right has society to do such things ? The right 
that is before all government — the Divine Magna Charta — 
the right that makes society or government possible, the 
right which lies back of all statutory law, the right which 
God gives to society to defend and protect itself against 
anything and all things whatsoever that destroys it. And 
yet many good people say: "The State has no right to 
enact and enforce laws to suppress the whisky traffic." 
As if the right to close bar-rooms were identical with the 
right to make men religious by force of law ! As if the 
right to sell whisky were a right of conscience ! 

If a man says, "the State has no right to prohibit the 
whisky traffic, ' ' he is bound first to prove this : Every man, 
in organized society, has an inalienable and illimitable 
right to do whatever pleases him, without reference to the 



18 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

wishes or interests of other people. Than which, as we 
read God's word and the great book of humanity, nothing 
can be more false. 

The simple truth is, society has, by gift of God, the 
right to forbid and put down any course of conduct that 
corrupts and destroys the virtue of the people, that breaks 
the peace and imperils the safety of the community. 

NO WAR ON OPINIONS. 

We do not claim for society the right to make men 
think right, but to forbid them to do things injurious. 
Society has no right to war on mere opinions. Society 
may not punish a man for thinking that he has a right to 
two wives; it may punish him for taking two. It may 
not punish a man for thinking he has a right to work on 
Sunday ; it claims the right to say he shall not do it. It 
may not punish a man for thinking he has the right to his 
neighbor's goods ; it puts him in jail if he steals them 
secretly, or seizes them by force. Society may endure the 
fool who preaches communism so long as he keeps his 
opinions to himself, or keeps his hands off his neighbor's 
property. But when he begins to proclaim his right, 
society may notify him to keep silence. When he begins 
to assert communism by appropriating other people's 
property, society puts a striped coat on him and tells him 
to break rock or work roads for the common good. 

WAR ON BAR-ROOMS, NOT ON BAR-KEEPERS. 

No prohibitionist talks of the right to war on mere 
opinions. The State cannot lift her hand against con- 
science. Persecution for opinion's sake is a folly and a 
crime. Some cry out, "Intolerance." Not so; we do 
not advocate suppressing bar-keepers, but bar-rooms. It 
is war on the bad business, not on the man. 

Moreover, the suppression of bar-rooms would be a 
great mercy to bar-keepers. 

But this talk about the rights of conscience, as applied 
to the whisky traffic, is mere stuff. There is no right of 
conscience in it. 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 19 

No man sells whisky for conscience sake, but for money's 
sake. No honest man pleads the right to sell whisky as a 
right of conscience. It is no more a matter or right of 
conscience than is smuggling, or arson, or highway rob- 
bery. And such is the educating power of law that dram- 
selling would be as dishonorable to-day as other wrongs 
done to society had society through its penal administra- 
tion, during the last few hundred years, defined and pun- 
ished drunkard-making as it deserves. Rights of opinion ! 
rights of conscience, indeed ! Where is the man who sells 
whisky from convictions of duty, or prays God's blessing 
upon his performance of this duty ? 

OUR LAWS ARE INCONSISTENT 

With the denial of the right of prohibition. The State 
does now, in many ways, hinder and repress the traffic in 
intoxicating drinks. Some of them we mention : 

FINES IN ADVANCE— NOT TAXES. 

i. License laws are in the nature of a fine. They are 
not simply tax laws. The license fee, whether imposed 
by the general government, by State law, or by municipal 
enactment, is not fixed on the ordinary principles of tax- 
ation. The ad valorem principle is perhaps never consid- 
ered in determining the amount of the license fee. The 
bar-keeper's license is not in the same category as the doc- 
tor's, or lawyer's. It is not the case of the merchant, 
paying so much into the city treasury on his quarterly or 
annual sales. It is not the case of the property holder 
paying according to the market value of his estate. We 
instance this case : In a certain town in Georgia the mer- 
chants pay a fixed per cent, on the amount of their sales 
after they are made ; the bar-keeper pays one thousand 
dollars before he can begin to sell drinks. And he must 
pay if his sales are insufficient to pay for his sign-board. 

Whence this difference? Clearly enough, society, by 
the imposition of this extraordinary tax, mulcts the re- 
tailer as a sort of punishment in advance for engaging in a 
bad business. Here indeed is a war on opinion ! Society 



20 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

fines a man one thousand dollars not for what he has done, 
but for what he says he is going to do. 

The 155,850 "licensed saloons" reported by the Uni- 
ted States Commissioner, are not taxed by the general gov- 
ernment, nor by the local governments, on the ad valorem 
principle. 

The fact is nearly every tax levied on the whisky busi- 
ness is a discriminating tax, and the character of the bus- 
iness induces the discrimination. We submit to all men 
of common sense this proposition : 

If any government — National, State, or Municipal — can 
tax a liquor dealer, and because he is a liquor dealer, ten or 
twenty times as heavily as a dry goods merchant or grocer 
doing the same amount of business is taxed, then govern- 
ment can make the liquor tax so heavy that it will be equiv- 
alent to prohibition ; for the discrimination grows out oi 
the confessed injuriousness of the liquor dealer's business. 
If it is bad enough to justify society in crippling it by the 
imposition of extraordinary taxes, it is bad enough to jus- 
tify society in taxing it to death. 

A SPECIOUS PLEA. 

The case is not helped by telling us : " The license tax 
may be applied to public education." For this extraordina- 
ry tax is not fixed for the benefit of education, but to hinder 
andrepress the business itself. Moreover, it would be a 
great farce to propose to license bar-rooms to educate poor 
children. Where the license tax puts one child at school, 
the drimkenness of fathers puts two out. The State may 
well hesitate before making the "revenues of vice" an es- 
sential part of its financial system. It is answered by 
some : " The State fines men for fighting and other dis- 
orderly and criminal conduct; are not these fines also 
"revenues of vice?" With this difference, we answer: 
The State does not "license" men to fight and commit 
nuisances. It says : " You must notjlo this." It fines 
for the violation of law. 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 21 

A WORD FROM MOSES. 

This plea for the whisky business that it affords large 
revenue will not do. It is a doctrine as dangerous as it is 
false. It would afford revenue to license gambling dens 
and houses of prostitution. Where the license tax puts 
one dollar in the public treasury, the business, by increas- 
ing the cost of government, puts ten out. It is worse than 
the case of "spigot" and " bung-hole.' ' For our part, 
we cannot forget the word of the Lord" that came to 
Moses — a word that States and Churches, proposing to raise 
revenues by questionable means, by "license" of a bad 
business, or the " sale of indulgences," would do well to 
consider : " The price of a dog and the hire of a whore 
are abomi7iation to the Lord." 

HOW GOVERNMENT INTERFERES WITH THIS 
BUSINESS. 

2. We find, moreover, that government interferes with 
the liquor business as to special persons — both as to dealers 
and buyers. In some States before a man begins to sell 
drinks he must have " a certificate of moral character." 
As if a man might not be good enough to sell drinks ! 

The law, after taking the license fee, says to the bar- 
keeper, "You must not sell drinks to minors." 

Is there a bar-keeper in the whole nation who has not 
violated this law ? Is there one who has not sold liquor 
to mere boys ? If there is, it would be worth going a 
journey to see him. He is too good for his business. 

CLOSED ON ELECTION DAYS. 

3. Again, government interferes with the liquor busi- 
ness on special occasions. Many of the States and cities 
peremptorily close the bar-rooms on election days, al- 
though their proprietors have paid these governments a 
stipulated price for the privilege of running their business. 
This question occurs to us : 

If government has no right to shut up bar-rooms three 
hundred and sixty-five days in the year, what right has 
government to shut them up one day in the year — as on 



22 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

election day, the day of all days best for the liquor busi- 
ness — the day of all days when drinks are in demand and 
the dealer could reap his harvest ? 

CLOSED IN THE PRESENCE OF A RIOT. ' 

During the riots in Pittsburg, a few years ago, the mayor 
issued a proclamation closing every bar-room in the city. 
People approved his proclamation. By what right did he 
close the bar-rooms ? The public safety required it. Sains 
bopuli suprema lex est, said the old Romans ; the safety of 
the people is the supreme law. And it is good doctrine. 
But if the bar-rooms in Pittsburg had been closed a few 
days sooner, many precious lives and millions worth of 
property would have been saved. Had they been closed a 
few days sooner it is morally certain that there would have 
been no riots at all. 

WHY NOT PREVENT RIOTS? 

During the progress of the riots the bar-rooms increased 
the danger to an intolerable degree, and they were closed. 
But there is always danger where liquor is sold. If the 
government may close drinking places in the presence of 
i great danger, why may it not close them soon enough to 
anticipate and prevent that danger? This government 
assumes the right to do, as we have seen, on election days. 

Let us consider this question : Whether, if the proba- 
bility of aggravating a riot is a reason for interfering with 
a business a man has paid a large price for the privilege of 
running, does not the probability of a street brawl and a 
man or two shot dead every hour a dram shop is open, 
constitute a reason for saying it shall not be open at all ? 

THE RIGHT TO REPRESS IS THE RIGHT TO SUP- 
PRESS. 

Summing up at this point, we affirm : If government 
has the right to hinder the liquor business by the impo- 
sition of extraordinary taxes, called license fees, it has the 
right to stop the business altogether ; if government has 
the right, for the sake of the public safety, to close drink- 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 23 

ing-houses on election days — best of all days for selling 
drinks — government has the right, for the sake of the 
public safety, to. close them every day in the year ; if gov- 
ernment has the right to close drinking-houses in the 
presence of a riot, government has the right to make riots 
nearly impossible by keeping them closed. The right to 
wound a snake implies the right to kill him. 

The right to hinder, discredit, cripple and repress the 
liquor business implies the right to suppress it altogether. 

INDEMNITY. 
The morals and peace of society left out of the view, 
drinking-houses, if allowed to exist at all, should be made 
to pay as much as they cost. The license fees should be 
large enough to indemnify society (in so far as money can 
do it) for all its outlay in the vain endeavor to protect 
itself against the evils and injuries that inevitably grow 
out of the business. If selfish men insist on the privilege 
of making money by selling liquors, they should, to say 
the least that can be said upon the subject, be held to the 
most rigid accountability for the results of their business. 
Every State and municipal government should take meas- 
ures to ascertain as accurately as possible how much its 
expenses are increased by the crimes and pauperism in- 
cident to drunkenness. Government cannot compute 
" consequential damages M in money-measures ; the misery 
and shame, the widowhood and orphanage, the degrada- 
tion of manhood, the paralysis of industry and the in- 
crease of pauperism — saying here not one word about 
eternal issues — cannot be estimated in dollars and cents. 
But there are outlays, made necessary by this business, that 
can be estimated. 

FIND OUT THE COST. 

Let every court inquire how much its expenses are in- 
creased by the crimes and disorders that flow from the 
liquor traffic. Let every municipality ascertain the cost 
of the extra police and other enginery of government 
made necessary by open drinking-houses. The cost to 
tax-payers of enduring drinking-houses can be ascertained 



24 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

with approximate accuracy. Now if we will have drink- 
ing-houses, let every extra dollar they cost society be laid 
upon the men who keep them, and who are the only men 
that make money out of them. By every' token, by every 
principle of common sense and common justice, the men 
who own and run the business that entails upon govern- 
ment extra and enormous expenses should be made to pay 
every dollar of it. As the matter now stands, the dealers 
pay a mere bagatelle, called a license fee, and make large 
money out of the business. The sober, working, tax- 
paying people, who deplore the evils that grow out of the 
business, have to pay nearly the whole of the extra ex- 
penses incurred by society in protecting itself against 
drunkards ! This is a state of things to be sure ! And in a 
civilized and Christian country, A. D., 1880! 

WHO SHOULD PAY THE EXTRA $8,000? 

To illustrate : Suppose that in a given city the cost of 
maintaining ten policemen and the prison is $10,000 a 
year with drinking-houses in full blast, and that two police- 
men would be ample, at a cost of $2,000 a year, if there 
were no drinking-houses, who should pay the extra $8,000? 
The bar-keepers. 

Let that city raise the extra $8,000 out of the very 
business that makes the expenditure necessary. Let the 
county and State governments estimate what part of their 
expenses is due to the whisky traffic and collect that 
amount out of the traffic. This would, to say the least of 
it, be more just than the present method, i. e., collecting 
it out of the good citizens who make no money out of it, 
but lose money, peace, safety and good name ; who suffer 
many great evils at the hands of those who grow rich upon 
the vices of their fellow-men. Government should keep 
a "Damages Account" with the whisky business (if it be 
allowed to exist at all) and indemnify society for its losses. 
(Here let us ask, in parenthesis : What right has govern- 
ment to authorize one class of its citizens to conduct a 
business that injures the rest ? To conduct a business whose 
"Damages Account" must be settled, not by those who 
make money by it, but by those who lose money by it ?) 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 25 

GOOD CITIZENS TO BLAME. 

If there is such a thing as injustice, it is exhibited in 
collecting the extra $5,000 or $10,000, as the case may 
be, out of men engaged in useful callings ; if there is such 
a thing as justice, it would be exhibited in forcing the 
whisky business to pay all the extra expenses incurred by 
society in tolerating it. This would be getting off cheap- 
ly indeed. The patience of industrious and sober people 
is marvelous. For generations they have been paying the 
damages (all but the bagatelle license fees), direct and 
consequential, that grow out of a business that brings 
money only to the men who carry it on at a loss to every- 
body else. 

How much longer will good citizens carry this intolera- 
ble burden ? Just as long as they will to carry it and no 
longer. They can unload if they will. Whenever they 
resolve to do it they can drop this " Old Man of the Sea," 
and without making him drunk. Good citizens who groan 
under this burden have themselves to blame. 

INDEMNITY TO FAMILIES. 

But paying the extra expenses imposed upon society by 
the evils that flow from the whisky traffic will not, by any 
means, meet the case. 

The fa?nilies of the victims should have recourse upon 
those who bring them ruin. Every State should enact and 
enforce " the Ohio law," or a simpler and better one if 
possible. A home is utterly ruined by drunkenness. 
Millions cannot indemnify the wife and children for their 
dishonor and lost paradise. But there is in every sober 
husband and father a money value. It is easy to estimate 
it fairly. Suppose his wages are $2.00 a day and, as the 
insurance men say, his " expectation of life" is twenty 
years. Suppose there are only 300 working days in the 
year. His money value is $1 2,000. Cheap at that ! The 
business that destroys that money value should replace it 
in cash. If it cannot — crush the business that robs women 
and children and can't pay its "damages account," 

It is no answer to say : " Somebody else would have 
sold it to him." A certain man did. Let him pay ade- 



26 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

quate damages. The murderer might say: "If I had 
not shot him, somebody else might, or lightning might 
have killed him. ,, Quite true, but the State hangs the 
man who did the shooting. 

WIDOWS WITHOUT REMEDY. 

How inconsistent we are ! How childish and coward- 
ly ! If a railroad kills a cow, or a pig, it must pay, and 
generally much more than the cow or pig was worth. 
When people break their legs or necks jumping on or off 
cars the cry is : " Make the road pay. ' ' We know a widow 
in a certain city who was paid $20,000 by a railroad 
because her husband was killed by a train falling through 
a rotten bridge. But in the same city were widows 
enough — starving in garrets and cellars — whose husbands 
had been killed by whisky. And they had no recourse. 

If the whisky business is a legitimate business, it should 
be held to the same sort of responsibility that binds other 
legitimate business. If it is an illegitimate business it has 
small show of reason for asking special favor. s 

Has a bar-room more rights than a railroad? Has a 
bar-keeper more rights than any other man ? 

REPRESSION AND PROTECTION. 
We are for prohibition — suppression. Also for what- 
ever tends to this result. While we seek to suppress let us 
also repress. There are a few obvious and, as we suppose, 
altogether important strategic points that the friends of 
temperance, of law, and order should seize and fortify. 
Among them we point out some. 

I. DANGER SIGNALS. 
The places were liquor is sold should be known by all 
men to be what they are — drinking houses. They should, 
every one of them — the gilded and gorgeous "saloons" of 
the cities and the wretched grog-shops of the cross-roads — 
be made to wear their badge. " Licensed to Sell Liquor" 
should be placed over every door. The unskilled in the 
enemy's arts are at least entitled to the benefit of danger 
signals. 



A TLEA FOR PROHIBITION. &l 

Even pirates should be willing to fight under their ap- 
propriate flag — the skull and cross-bones. 

2. SAVE OUR BOYS. 

Prompt and severe punishment should follow every dis- 
coverable offense of selling liquor to minors. Is there a 
community on the globe, in which liquor is sold, where 
boys do not sometimes get drunk? Is there a bar-keeper 
in the land at whose counter no boy ever bought a drink ? 
Most — perhaps all — of the States have laws that declare 
the selling of intoxicating drinks to minors to be an in- 
dictable offense. 

Unfortunately these laws are rarely enforced. Until 
we enforce these laws there is no protection to our fami- 
lies. They never will be generally enforced with a low 
state of public sentiment on the subject. They will be 
enforced everywhere whenever fathers and mothers make up 
their minds that they shall be enforced. And not before. 
When public sentiment rises to the right level, grand- 
juries will find true bills, solicitors will prosecute, juries 
will convict, judges will punish. 

A GREAT CRIME. 

The crime of enticing a boy into a drinking den and 
making a drunkard of him is of high grade. It deserves 
severe and certain punishment. The bar-keeper who 
does it is an enemy to the family. He corrupts life at 
the fountain. There are few greater wrongs that he can 
commit upon the peace and purity of family life. Perhaps 
only one greater. The fathers and mothers of the land 
should create a public sentiment that will compel the 
prompt and rigid enforcement of all laws against selling 
intoxicating liquors to minors. 

And the fathers and mothers in this country can, if they 
will, make it hot for judges, juries, solicitors, or attorneys 
who shield the shameless men who make drunkards of our 
tender boys. 

We believe the day is coming — that it is already dawn- 
ing — when they will do it. Heaven help fathers and 
mothers in a "quarrel so just," in a war so holy ! 



28 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

3. PUNISH THE SALE OF POISONS. 

The State should enact and enforce stringent laws 
against the sale of adulterated liquors. When men make 
up their minds to sell liquor they are very apt to increase 
their profits by adulterating their stocks. If they would 
only be content with watering their liquors ! But chemi- 
cals — some of them virulent poisons — are employed, as 
has been proved by thorough analysis a thousand times. 
Any intoxicating liquor is bad for those who drink ; poi- 
soned liquor is slow death. Sometimes not so slow. 

Now if the State will "license" drinking-houses, the 
State should feel itself bound to see to it that its citizens 
who buy at its "licensed" houses get whisky and not 
poison. 

The State of Georgia (as do other States) appoints " in- 
spectors of fertilizers," that the farmers may be protected 
against adulterated guanos. Now the public is being in- 
formed daily that what is sold in the shops as "pure 
whisky " and " pure wine " is largely made up of chemi- 
cals, more or less poisonous. If the State legitimizes the 
whisky business by "licensing " it for a consideration, the 
State should see to it that its " licensed " agents sell what 
they buy the privilege of selling. 

The selling of liquors adulterated with poisons should 
be an indictable and punishable offense. It is worse than 
swindling ; it is poisoning. 

If the dealer puts in the defence, "I did it ignorantly," 
the answer is, " You have no right to be ignorant of what 
you sell. ' ' The law punishes a druggist who, in ignorance, 
sells strychnine for Epsom salts, or arsenic for quinine. 

4. LET SOCIETY MOVE. 

Society should ostracize the bar-rooms. There is much 
whining now-a-days about charity and the law of kind- 
ness. We believe in charity, but it is not charity to make 
wrong-doing honorable. It is not charity to encourage 
our brother-men in following a vicious and harmful busi- 
ness. 

There is no good in mincing words : The whisky busi- 
ness is not an honorable business. It is not one of the 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 29 

industries of the country. It is evil, and only evil, and 
that continually. No possible success in it can redeem it. 
No varnish can hide its deformity. 

Treating a bar-keeper humanely, politely, kindly (for 
he also is a brother man,) is one thing; recognizing the 
respectability of his business is another, and very different 
thing. /We sometimes think that women are cruel to their 
fallen sisters. They may be, but there is compensation in 
their cruelty; it is one of their chief protections.) 

A GIRL'S FOLLY. 
We multiply bar-rooms, and thereby multiply drunkards 
when we recognize the honorableness of the business. It 
is not honorable, and we know it is not honorable. It is 
a sham and a hypocrisy to pretend that it is honorable. 
Not long ago, we heard of a young lady of respectable 
family, leaning upon a bar-keeper's arm in a public assem- 
bly. She made his business respectable, and increased it 
precisely in proportion to the extent of her influence. If 
she had a brother, she increased the probabilities of his 
becoming a drunkard. It was a great folly. Cannot the 
women of the country stop this bad business ? 

WHAT VOTERS CAN DO. 
We make the bar-rooms respectable when we elect drun- 
kards to office, when we vote for men who carry their elec- 
tions by "treats." It is a shame and a sin in candidates. 
When we vote for such men, we become " partakers of their 
evil deeds.' ' What must our sons conclude as to our opin- 
ion of the liquor-business when they see us vote for men 
known to be drunkards, or tipplers, or who carry elections 
by "free liquor?" When they see us vote for such men 
after hearing us pray God to give us " wise and good men 
to rule over us?" We make young politicians drunkards 
by the premium we put on dram-shops and drunkenness. 
Let us " eschew shams. }1 

5. THE DUTY OF ALL WHO TEACH. 
All who undertake to instruct or influence the public 
mind should take hold of this question. The teacher, the 



30 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION, 

journalist, the preacher, should expound the subject in all 
its bearings. Alas ! some papers are subsidized by this 
unholy traffic ; they give their whole influence to make it 
reputable. Let papers that have not sold their liberty use 
the more diligc?ice and courage. 

Every man and woman fit to teach children should teach 
the sin and danger of drunkenness — the sin and ruin that 
follow in the train of the whisky traffic. For " death and 
hell follow" after it. Let the " number and name" of 
the "beast" be shown. The pulpit should speak out 
clearly, boldly, persistently, wisely. If men preach on re- 
pentance, let them point out the sins to be repented of — 
drunkenness and liquor-selling are among them. If they 
preach on hell, let them point out the roads that lead into 
it — drunkenness and liquor-selling, (wide they are, and 
well-trod,) are two of them. 

It is a theme proper for the pulpit— if sin and its retri- 
butions are proper themes. The pulpit that is too delicate 
and kid-gloved to warn the people against the sins of drunk- 
ness and liquor selling, is too delicate to do its work. Let 
it be packed away with other perfumed millinery. 

We do not ask preachers, teachers, or journalists to 
confine their deliverances to this one theme. We do not 
believe in a one-stringed gospel, for the press, the lecture- 
room, or the pulpit. But if those who assume to teach — 
in pulpit, press, or lecture room — want to "help people 
out of their miseries' ' (as it was said Thomas Guthrie de- 
lighted to do), to lift them out of ignorance and vice, to 
"save souls from death," then this is one theme that they 
can not overlook. 

What might not be done in ten years — in five years — if 
teachers, journalists and preachers would do their duty? 
If one-half of them would do it ? 

6. LET THE CHURCH LEAD THE FIGHT. 

The Christian Church should lead the fight. It 
should throw itself into the breach. It should show it- 
self the best temperance organization in the world by 
planting itself firmly in doctrine, practice and discipline 
on the foundation of Christ and of the Apostles. 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 81 

Some good people get nervous if a "resolution" ex- 
pressing an opinion on this monster evil of the times, 
should be offered in Conference, Convention, Synod, or 
Assembly. Some seem to be under the delusion that 
such resolutions squint at the "Union of Church and 
State!" Some shirk from saying what they believe on 
such subjects, as if they were not "religious" enough for 
Church-conference discussions ! They are afraid of in- 
troducing things secular into the currents of Church 
thought ! As if the Church had been sent into this world 
only to be good — and take care of its respectabilities ! As 
if its great business were not to do good in this present 
sinful world ! 

NOT LAW BUT CONVICTION. 

We are not thinking of new Church laws. Passing a new 
law is an easy refuge for a troubled conscience. There are 
laws enough — what the Church wants for this fight against 
drunkenness and liquor-selling, is not law, but conviction ; 
not statutes, but right sentiment, with faith and courage to 
back it. 

Would God the power that is in the Church were deliv- 
ered fully upon this "abomination of desolation." 

Then would " wisdom be justified of her children." 

WHAT CAN BE DONE. 
What we want at this time, is the voice of each commu- 
nity on the question of prohibition. Many towns and 
counties in Georgia have closed the bar-rooms — some in 
one way, some in another. In some counties, the issue 
has been made in the election of Ordinary; a man has 
been elected who will not issue license. In some counties, 
where commissioners have jurisdiction of such matters, 
they have placed the license tax (jine, it should be called, 
for it is in the nature of a fine and not a tax,) so high as 
to make it prohibitory. In a number of incorporated 
towns, a board of aldermen has been elected, pledged to 
fix the tax so high as to amount to prohibition. In others, 
under special act of the Legislature, elections have been 
held on the question of "license " or no " license." 



32 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

LOCAL OPTION. 

There are many ways of getting at the trouble. These 
methods all involve what is called " local option* ' — that 
is the free choice of the community. 

This is a fair principle; each community should have 
the right to say whether it will have bar-rooms in its midst. 
It would seem a great hardship that a local minority should 
impose their choice in such a matter on the majority. It 
would seem an equal hardship that an outside majority 
should impose their preferences on a community removed 
from them. To illustrate: The town of Carrollton, in 
Georgia, has, under this " local option" principle, closed 
bar-rooms. Suppose that there are 400 voters in Carrollton, 
and that 250, or any other majority, say — "We don't want 
these bar-rooms ; they corrupt our youths, pauperize our 
people, undermine our morals, endanger the peace, and 
put in jeopardy every hour the lives of our people. " Is it 
fair, is it just, is it Democratic, is it Republican, that 150 
or any other minority, should say — " We will have bar- 
rooms in Carrollton ?" Or suppose the question should be 
made to turn on the votes of a whole State. Then every 
one of the 400 votes in Carrollton might say — "We don't 
want bar-rooms, " but 401 voters the other side of the State 
might answer — "But you shall have bar-rooms.' ' 

In such matters, the co7nmunity, the county, the town, the 
"municipality" should be free to say— ■" We close these bar- 
rooms, ' ' 

We would rejoice to see every drinking house in Geor- 
gia, and in every other State, closed permanently. But our 
community can't afford to wait till every other community 
joins us and says — "close the drinking houses." We wish 
to close them now. We should have the right to do it. 
This is true Democracy— true Republicanism. 

KEEP IT OUT OF "POLITICS." 
Another advantage of making local issues — of settling 
this question by communities is, it keeps this great social 
and moral question out of what is called " politics." This 
is not only important — it is vital. For the professional 
politician cannot be trusted in such issues — if in any. We 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 33 

don't want this question tangled up in party platforms, 
conventions, candidates, etc. On such questions we may 
vote as men, and not simply as Democrats or Republicans, 
unless, indeed, one or both parties should consider " open 
bars and free liquor" as of the essence of their organiza- 
tion ! When it comes to that, good men can " bolt." 

DEFEAT HIM IN DETACHMENTS. 

Moreover, it will be easier to defeat the enemy by taking 
him in detachments. It was possible for Carrollton to close 
the bars ; at that time it is at least doubtful if the whole 
State of Georgia could have been carried for prohibition. 
But when a score or two of Carrolltons have freed them- 
selves, it will be easier for other towns to deliver themselves. 
By and by, sober people will have enough fortified garri- 
sons scattered throughout the State to conquer and hold 
the entire territory. 

IN EVERY COMMUNITY 

Let us begin. At every local election, as for town and 

county officers, make prohibition an issue. If A wants 

office, find out what he has to say on this subject. If his 
answer does not satisfy or command confidence, say to 
him : '-We can't vote for you ; it is infinitely more impor- 
tant to us to be freed from these drinking houses than to 
put you in office. We can get on without you; we can't 
get on with the drinking houses." 

If all the right-minded people will say such things to 
candidates, they will come to terms. If not, they can step 
down and out. 

No town or county is so poor in men that it can't find 
sober men and anti-drinking house men to fill its offices. 
No town or county is so poor that it must have in office 
drinking men and drinking-house men. 

If any party is so poor in men that it can't put up sober 
candidates, it is time to beat that party. 

We must quit voting for drunkards, and corrupt men, for 
any sort of office. 

Senator B. H. Hill's "Davis Hall" speech had the right 
doctrine, and most eloquently did he expound it : 



34 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

"To BE PERSONALLY CORRUPT, IS TO BE POLITICALLY 
CORRUPT/ ' 

If men want our votes let them show themselves worthy : 
If they say: "We must have bar-rooms," let us answer: 
" We won't have them." If we fail the first trial, begin the 
next day to organize for the next election. 

PROGRESS AND SIGNS. 

The conviction is growing that we should close the drink- 
ing-houses. The best men of all parties are coming to the 
conclusion that the time has come to close them. There 
is great progress in public sentiment on this general ques- 
tion. Thirty years ago it was almost impossible to get any 
sort of law passed in the Georgia Legislature that even re- 
stricted the liquor business. Now, with any sort of sense or 
zeal on the part of its advocates, it would be hard to defeat 
a bill giving any town or county full right to try this 
question. 

The member of the next Legislature who would make a 
speech in favor of the drinking-houses, would hardly be re- 
elected. And this is not intolerance. If he has a right to 
his opinion, the people have a right to their opinion, also, 
and the better people don't want that sort of a represen- 
tative. 

If the sober people, the bone and sinew of the country, 
do once unite earnestly and courageously to shut up the 
bar-rooms, the local politicians will not be so hard to over- 
come. They read the " signs of the times " as they read 
the indications of the weather changes. 

Office seekers should consider of these deep under- currents 
in the public heart, and they will consider them. 

If we can close the drinking-houses in our community in 
one year, let us do it ; if it takes two years, ten years, a life- 
time, let us close them. Let it be understood that there is 
" no discharge in this war," and no compromise that will 
allow drinking-houses to do their evil and deadly work. 

AN ILLUSTRATION. 

Many examples might be given, but seeing that we have 
small space, let one answer. It is a statement of a success- 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 35 

ful " local option " fight in the goodly town of Carrollton, 
Carroll county, Georgia. It is from the pen of the Rev. 
J. W. Lee, member of the North Georgia Conference. 

Carrollton, Ga., April 24, 1880. 

Dear Brother : — No county in Georgia had more still-houses 
and bar-rooms to the number of inhabitants than Carroll, twenty years 
ago. Drinking places were not only to be found in the little towns, 
but also at cross-roads and country places throughout the county. No 
more unfavorable place for the success of prohibition could have 
been selected than this county. It was settled by a class of citizens 
who regarded plenty of corn whisky and peach brandy essential to 
good living. Liquor was sold without scruple and drank without 
stint. Many of the people spent all their means, beyond a bare living, 
for strong drink. Education and churches were neglected; ignorance 
and vice prevailed to such an alarming extent that the very name of 
the county became a by- word and reproach in the State. It was 
called the " free State of Carroll." The better citizens going from 
the county were ashamed to acknowledge where they were from. 
The county of Carroll was once synonymous with still-houses, chicken 
fighting, horse-swapping, pony clubs, one- ox-carts, poverty, piney- 
woods and ignorance. 

The first move toward prohibition in this county was made at Bow- 
don. In the very act by which the town was incorporated was a 
clause prohibiting the sale of whisky in so many miles of the place. 
There is one town in Georgia in which a drop of liquor has never 
been sold by law. [Two : never in Oxford. A. G. H.] 

In 1863 Dr.W.W. Fitts mc/ed to Carrollton, and began at once the 
abolishing of the whisky traffic by law. He stood well nigh alone for 
several years. With an energy that never tired, and a determination 
that never faltered, he worked on. He was foiled frequently by the 
liquor men, but he never gave up the struggle. Other men moved 
into the town and united their influence with his. They managed 
the prohibition movement with great prudence and tact. They did 
not organize for one election, or one year. After an election, at 
which they were defeated by the liquor men, they did not abandon 
their hopes, but began again to work for another election. By keep- 
ing organized all the time they conserved their forces, and though 
they did not succeed for several years, they were all the time educa- 



36 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

ting public opinion. Thus they prepared to hold the field when they 
won it. 

The prohibition men in every town and county in Georgia should 
organize. At all municipal elections they should have dry tickets in 
the field, and have them there every year. It is a shame that in many 
towns in our State the prohibition party has been driven from the 
field with one defeat. Much of the ground we have gained has been 
abandoned just because the temperance men sought to succeed in one 
election only, taking no thought for any other. It takes as much ef- 
fort and tact to hold a field as it does to win it. And success is al- 
ways harder to win the second election than the first. The first year 
after prohibition there is a good deal of liquor drank on the sly. 
Many people seem to drink for spite. At the second election the 
cry is "there has been more liquor drank this year than ever before." 
Many believe it., and say "there is no use to try any more." So they 
turn the whole thing over to the whisky dealers. 

In Carrollton the temperance men worked twelve years without 
success. In 1875 a bill was passed by the Legislature prohibiting the 
sale of liquor in the town. That bill was but the embodiment of 
public opinion, which, through a number of years, had been coming 
to active prohibitory opposition. Public opinion sought an ally in 
law, and law was sustained by public opinion. The victory won here 
was not a mean or an easy one. All the arguments in vogue among 
liquor men were used here. 

1. They said the trade of the town would be injured. 

2. That men would drink anyhow, therefore better license the busi- 
ness and get the revenue than force them to drink on the sly and get 
nothing. 

3. That if the bar-rooms did not sell it, the drug stores would. 
4 That it was taking away the rights of men. 

5. That it was an extreme measure by men who were a little too 
religious. 

6. The more humane of the liquor men contended that it would 
put the community at the mercy of the snakes, there being nothing 
that would counteract the poison of their bites but whisky ! 

But in spite of all opposition and abuse the temperance men suc- 
ceeded, and with results that are marvelous. 

1. The trade of the town has been more than doubled. Before 
the liquor traffic was abolished the trade of the place was about 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 37 

$200,000 a year; now it is $500,033 a year. There are thirty stores 
in town and I do not know of a single merchant among them who 
would not vote against the liquor traffic on purely business grounds. 
Mr. John W. Stewart, who has made a fortune here, says, as a business 
man, that he would not have liquor back for any consideration. 
Some of our leading merchants were opposed to prohibition at first 
because they feared that it would injure their trade. They are unan- 
imously in favor of it now. Tiie $30,000 that was spent here for 
whisky prior to 1875 * s now s P en t m building houses, improving 
stock, draining lands and paying taxes. The farmers are nearly all 
out of debt. Many of the men who were spending all their money 
for whisky have quit drinking and are making a support for their 
families, » 

2. The argument that men would drink anyhow does not hold 
good but with very few. 

Perhaps there are in every town some few men who have drank 
so long that they are slaves to the habit. Such men would send off 
and get whisky and drink anyhow, But we have learned that, with 
nearly all the people, whisky is like watermelons : The supply creates 
the demand. Do away with the supply and there will be no demand 
as a general thing. 

By prohibiting the sale of whisky in the towns of Georgia we will 
soon have a generation of young men who will have no desire for it 
whatever. 

3. We have two drug stores here, but not a particle ot liquor is 
sold in either one of them. The leading druggist here told me that 
he kept alcohol in the store, but he used it only for tinctures. An 
attempt was made by one of the druggists to sell bitters, but the grand 
jury soon found so many true bills against him that he promised the 
people of the town if they would ask the Judge to be as merciful in 
his fines as possible he would never sell another bottle of bitters, or 
drop of whisky. Every argument the whisky men used, has been 
proved by the light of experience, to be without force, and they 
have all been abandoned. There are a few men here who would like 
to see liquor brought back, but they are not silly enough to advance 
any reason for it more than that they love it, and would like to make 
money by selling it. 

4. In a moral point of view, the results of this movement in our 
town have been perfectly remarkable. The Solicitor of this Judicial 



38 A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 

circuit says there is less crime in this county than in any other in this 
circuit. Most of the people have joined the church. Profanity is 
almost unknown. On the train that comes daily into Carrollton not 
an officer or train hand on it ever swears an oath. 

The soberness and quiet which prevail here, even on election days 
and court weeks, strike visitors as being wonderful. At a barbecue 
here last year, though there were together about four thousand peo- 
ple, Col. Thomas Hardeman, who spoke on the occasion, said that he 
never saw a drunk man. He regarded it as something almost new 
under the sun. A committee of good men revised the jury box, leav- 
ing the names of those out who habitually drank whisky. The 
county has been electing, for the past twelve years, Dr. D. B. Juhan, 
Ordinary, who will not grant license to sell liquor anywhere in the 
county for love, or threats, or money. He has done a grand work 
for the county, and so could every Ordinary if he would* 

OBSERVATIONS. 

1. The prohibition movement in this county is a grand success. 
Three-fourths of the white people in Carrollton are opposed to the 
sale of whisky, and nearly the same proportion in the county. 

2. Prohibition would be a success in every town and county if the 
temperance men would work long enough to make a test of the bene- 
fit of it. The people of Newnan, Rome, Marietta, Cartersville, 
Cedartown, and many other places, tried it, but gave it up after the 
first year. It takes more than a year for some of the old soakers to 
get sober. It takes three or four years to see the benefit of it thor- 
oughly. I do not believe there is a town in Georgia that would ever 
sell liquor again after abolishing it four years. 

3. All the friends of prohibition should determine at once to be kind 
and polite at all hazards. The success of prohibition in Carrollton 
has been largely owing to the kindness and politeness of its friends. 
While they have been firm and determined, and constantly persever- 
ing they have used no ill-timed or harsh measures to carry their point. 
On election days and in the heat of canvassing they did not return 
cursing for cursing, or abuse for abuse, but they sought by kindness, 
patience and prudence to disarm the liquor men, and they have about 
succeeded, for in our last municipal election there were three candi- 
dates for mayor, and all on the dry side of the question. 

To succeed in this movement the temperance men will need a 
good deal of grace and self control. The liquor men generally be- 



A PLEA FOR PROHIBITION. 39 

come fierce and abusive. Those who work for truth and for God 
can afford to be kind and calm. 

4. If prohibition is a success in Georgia it will be so through the 
influence of the churches. The denominations here have ever been a 
unit on prohibition. The ministers have preached prohibition from 
the pulpit ; the men have talked prohibition on the streets, and the 
women have prayed for prohibition in their homes. 
Very truly yours, 

J. W. LEE. 



